Song Of The Nile Part 20

IN Juba's study I read the missive twice; then, as I dizzied, the lettering ran together like spilled ink. It wasn't the emperor's handwriting. Nor was it an expression of imperial fury. It was a formal and official doc.u.ment penned by Maecenas that summoned me to Greece. A broken water clock perched precariously at the edge of Juba's writing table and he tinkered with its decorated parts, intent upon repairing it. "Why do you seem so stunned, Selene?"

Because the reckoning is finally at hand, I thought. More than a year had pa.s.sed since I'd fled Rome. Plenty of time for the emperor's cool anger to rise to a roiling boil. I'd used the time to make myself a capable queen; the reports he'd receive from legionaries and plantation owners should convince him I was a useful, if not essential, part of his plans. I'd gambled that his ambition was stronger than his vindictiveness. How anxious I was not to lose that gamble. "Why am I stunned, Juba? Why aren't you? What have you heard? What does the emperor intend?"

Juba carefully removed the little chime from the water clock, inspecting it for rust. "I'm not surprised that you've been summoned because all the Eastern royalty are being called to Samos. Archelaus of Cappadocia and Iamblichus of Emesa are both seeking to be reaffirmed to their kingdoms. I'm told that Augustus will restore Tarcondimotus to his ancestral lands. He might do the same for Mithridates III of Commagene." In short, there wasn't a petty prince in the Mediterranean world who wouldn't be there, currying the emperor's favor in the hopes of retaining or regaining his patrimony. I was only different because I was a woman and because I was Cleopatra's daughter. Augustus had gone to the East to play kingmaker, and he was summoning me.

Juba leaned back, jingling the bell in his hand, avoiding my eyes, but his concentration on the water clock couldn't disguise the bitterness in his voice. "If I had to guess, Selene, I would say that at long last the emperor plans to give you your heart's desire."

At the word desire, an arrow of shame pinned me to my seat as I remembered my l.u.s.t-soaked lips pressed against Juba's mouth. In Rome, I'd given no consideration to the emperor's proposal to bear him a son, though it may have granted me everything. Then I'd kissed Juba for no advantage whatsoever. Regrettably, he had plainly read something into that kiss. Taken some sign from it. "I'm sorry," I whispered with genuine sorrow, for it seemed as if I were destined always to disappoint him.

"Augustus will expect tribute," Juba said, stoutly. He was right. From the other princes, the emperor would demand monuments and oaths of loyalty. From me, the emperor would demand grain, but I couldn't lie to myself. Augustus might demand much more. You want Egypt, he'd said. Well, I want you to give me a son. Inwardly, I flailed like a bird in a net. Could I actually let Augustus put his defiling hands on me? Even for the throne of Egypt, could I open my legs for the same man who had forced them apart?

Augustus had wanted me to be his Cleopatra, his lover, the mother of his son. Perhaps that was what he still wanted. Or perhaps his single objective was now to punish me. If that was the case, my only defense would be to enchant him, drawing his fascination tight as a bowstring until he'd risk anything to have me and do anything to please me. Digging my fingernails into my palms as if to raise blood, I reminded myself that I'd endured worse than a rutting man inside me. What right did I have to hold my body somehow sacred while others suffered? Hadn't Isis herself written that I was more than flesh?

Juba interrupted my thoughts, a look of melancholy settling on his features. "Are you going to go?"

I let the summons fall from my lax grip. "What choice do I have?"

Twenty-seven.

DESPITE the king's distress, the mood in the palace was festive. Crinagoras lifted his wine cup in yet another toast to himself. "Such good fortune for Alexandria! Not only will Egypt be blessed with her rightful queen, but that fair city will soon be the home of the greatest court poet ever known."

Lady Lasthenia sighed with sentiment. "Oh, I have missed the Museum. All that we've learned here will generate much interest as a series of lectures."

Even Memnon, usually so professionally distant, quietly observed, "We'll be exiles no more."

I was struck by the red-rimmed emotion in his eyes. Had none of my courtiers come to love Mauretania as I had? Or was it simply that none of them knew the price I might have to pay? Unutterably selfish ideas crowded my thoughts. I flirted with the idea of refusing the summons. Of staying here in Mauretania, where I might live in defiance. I fantasized about building something new, something untouched by the emperor . . . but I was a Ptolemy and these people, these Alexandrians, had been my mother's subjects. Now they were mine. I must fight for them. I must fight for my heritage. I must fight for Egypt.

At the start of their romance, my father had famously summoned my mother. At Tarsus, she'd come to him as Aphrodite. She'd come to seduce him, and no one who saw her gilded barge with its perfumed grottoes could've mistaken her intentions. Was that part of the grand drama that the emperor felt compelled to re-create? I wasn't the only one to wonder. "He expects you to make a spectacle of yourself, doesn't he?" Chryssa asked, as if calculating how this journey might drain the treasury.

"Why wouldn't she make a spectacle?" Lady Lasthenia asked. "She's good at it. Our queen has theatrical sensibilities. If she's to be the Queen of Egypt, isn't it appropriate to show that she's wealthy, powerful, and beloved of the G.o.ds? How else will people understand the import?"

She wasn't wrong. Before the other royalty of the world, it must never seem that I was just a minor queen of an unimportant Western kingdom. I'd have to bring lavish gifts that wouldn't laden down our s.h.i.+p-smaller things of value, made of pearls and ivory. I'd need extravagant royal costumes and even the sails of my s.h.i.+p ought to be dyed in Gaetulian purple. Every prince in the world must see me as a worthy heir to my mother's legacy.

It would all play out on the world stage, so I must consider the symbolism behind every choice. With the emperor, everything was a game, a test. This one might well be the most important of my life. So how was I to make my entrance? Was I to dock the s.h.i.+p and invite Augustus and his men to join me for a feast? To flaunt my wealth, should I, like my mother before me, dissolve my pearl earrings in a gla.s.s of strong wine vinegar and drink it down? No, I thought. Augustus might have claimed my father's place, but he didn't see himself as Antony. He was Caesar. If I went to him, better to be rolled out at his feet in secret than come to him in open invitation.

If I went to him . . . How was there any other choice?

I might finally be going home to Egypt, so why did I feel so melancholy? Perhaps it was my maudlin tendencies or perhaps it was because I might never see Mauretania again. The cream and yellow marble of our palace, the green columns, the blue Berber carpets, the tapestries and statuary, the aloe plants beneath the almond and olive trees, and the glittering fountains in which my daughter loved to play. Without remembering how I got there, I found myself standing in the gardens, amidst the ocean of lavender that swayed in the breeze. When Euphronius came upon me, the sun was setting into the glow of dusk; I hadn't noticed the lateness of the hour. "Majesty, you'll send for me, won't you?"

It was understood that he couldn't come with me to Greece, where he might be recognized as a mischief maker. "I'll send for you the moment I step foot in Egypt . . . if I do."

"This may be your last opportunity, Majesty."

One didn't need to see into the Rivers of Time to know that. Lifting my arms, I hoped to catch sight of symbols carved there, red and vivid, serpents and sails, ropes and staves, papyrus reeds and boats. There was nothing. No hieroglyphs to guide me. "Isis used to speak to me. She used to etch her words in my skin. If she'd only show me the way . . ."

"I'll find a blade," Euphronius said. "If she's called by the blood of her followers, I'll spill my blood for you."

His offer, so earnestly made, so faithful, touched me. Once, Philadelphus had given his blood for just such a purpose, but now it seemed wrong to call upon my G.o.ddess by making someone else suffer. "No, Euphronius. I suspect Isis isn't to be summoned to account like some client queen." When the old man's face fell, I took his hands. "There's a story about Isis in Tyre. To protect her child and all of Egypt from the dark G.o.d, she lay down as a prost.i.tute, did she not?"

"So some stories say," the old man admitted.

I fingered the jade amulet at my throat. "And I am the Resurrection . . ."

IN the days leading to my departure the Alexandrians weren't just festive but jubilant. By contrast, the Mauretanians were dispirited and, in Maysar's case, insolent. Hastily announcing his resignation in the empty audience room, the Berber chieftain gave no hint of that flas.h.i.+ng white smile I'd come to appreciate. "I wish you luck, madam. If it's time for you to return to Egypt, then it's time for me to return to my tribe. I wasn't meant for city living and can no longer be of use."

"That isn't true," I argued. "Without me here, Juba will need your advice more than ever."

Maysar snorted, his dark eyes boring into mine. "The Garamantes are a people much like the Egyptians. For months now, I've been extolling your virtues to their emissaries, making it known that you're a queen who honors the same things they do. Can I say the same of King Juba? Once you leave, it isn't difficult to predict what will happen. Within a year, Lucius Cornelius Balbus will use the legions of Africa Nova to crush these tribes and there'll be no sanctuary for them in Mauretania."

"Perhaps they deserve to be crushed," I said with a nonchalance I didn't feel. "They're rebels. The Romans aren't always wrong in all things. Perhaps the Garamantes will only respond to a show of violent force."

"You don't believe that," he said sadly.

I rubbed my forefingers over the pearled arms of my throne chair. "And you're not resigning because of the Garamantes. You're leaving because you're angry with me."

He shrugged his shoulders, throwing his blue-stained hands to the sides. "You're right. I am angry with you."

"Why? How have I offended you?"

An indignant puff of air burst from his lips. "You're abandoning Mauretania, madam, where you're needed. Where you're loved."

There was no pretense to be made about my ambitions, so I said, "I'm loved in Egypt too."

He gave a stubborn shake of his head. "Your mother is loved in Egypt. You are merely remembered. Mauretania is the land where the people have turned to you with hope. This is the city you've built. The city in which you rear your daughter, our beloved princess. But it isn't enough for you."

What did he want me to do? Who did he think I was? "I belong in Egypt. I'm a Ptolemy."

"Yes," he said, staring more boldly than a subject had a right to. "The last of the Ptolemies; I've heard it said. You've never forgiven yourself for it. Do you think you can bring your dead to life?"

"Yes, I do!" Was I not the Resurrection? "My family is dead and I must walk the steps they can't walk. I must breathe the breath that was stolen from their lungs. Speak the words their silenced tongues can't speak. It's a sacred thing. Berbers honor their ancestors, why shouldn't I?"

My words changed his expression and for a moment he bowed his head. When he lifted it again, he said, "Because you let yourself enjoy nothing that your mother didn't enjoy. Love nothing that she didn't love. You refuse to be content where she couldn't be content. I think you punish yourself for being alive. That is not sacred."

This was too much, and I rose to my feet. "I should have you flogged for speaking to me this way."

Contemptuously, he threw the end of his woolen burnoose over one shoulder. "You wouldn't even trouble yourself, madam. Your mind is on Egypt. You wish for Augustus to make you queen and Pharaoh. If he grants your wish, you'll live in Alexandria and we'll never see you again. It's understood by all. So I bid you farewell."

I was appalled. "I haven't dismissed you. Will you leave Chryssa too? Didn't you ask her to wed?"

He paused only long enough to say, "Cleopatra Antonia.n.u.s has chosen to be at your side, not mine, so I cannot marry her. I'm not so well mannered as our king to sit at the sh.o.r.e and watch my bride go."

I sought Chryssa in my rooms but found only a horde of servants packing up clothing, jewels, furnis.h.i.+ngs, and artwork-all my belongings, as if they too, didn't expect me to return. In all this bedlam, Tala's little son, Ziri, and my Isidora ran riot. To their great delight, the yellowish brown monkey was pelting the children with dates. Tala sat nearby, mixing a henna paste for her tattoos, raising no objection whatsoever. When I complained, she gave me a cool stare such as she hadn't done since I first arrived in Mauretania. "Your brother has already given me an earful of contempt today, Tala. If you plan to do the same, please let it wait until tomorrow."

She pounded the mortar down into the henna paste and a headache began to pound behind my eyes. "Perhaps it's better that we not speak of things upon which we'll never agree, Majesty."

"I have no choice but to go. You were with me in Rome. You know."

She stopped stirring the paste. "I know that you suffered in Rome as I've never seen you suffer. You were so sad and afraid. I can't be glad that you'll return to those people. I go with you only because Isidora must go."

Chryssa appeared in my doorway, giving a delicate snort. "Tala's going with us so she can spend time with her s.h.i.+p's captain. Hope she doesn't shame you with scandalous behavior."

Tala glared at Chryssa, but as it happened, I cared nothing about scandals with s.h.i.+p's captains. "Chryssa, you've made a place for yourself here as a freedwoman. You have a chance at happiness with Maysar. You don't have to go with me to Greece."

"I've always wanted to visit Greece," she said, checking my strongboxes to make sure they were locked. "Besides, you have too many young, inexperienced girls tending to you. I don't trust any of them to style you properly."

I rubbed at my temples. "You're not an ornatrix anymore. You preside over a royal monopoly. What you've done with the Gaetulian purple makes you as important as any minister in any other royal court."

Chryssa's voice changed then. It went deeper and filled with emotion. "I want them to see me. Livia. Augustus. I want them to see me standing upright and not cowering. I want them to see me wearing jewels that I own. I want them to see me as a freedwoman. Cleopatra Antonia.n.u.s."

I wanted her with me, so why did I discourage her? "Even the well-born cower before Augustus. Slave, freedwoman, or queen, remember that the emperor and his wife can do us harm."

But Chryssa wouldn't be dissuaded. She'd come with me, and Tala would come too. Next, I sent for the hetaera and she dipped gracefully before me. "Lady Circe," I said, pinching the bridge of my nose, for my headache had only worsened, "I'd like for you to accompany me to Greece."

This seemed to have surprised her as much as it did my other servants. Her painted eyes went wide, and for a moment, I thought she'd refuse. "Will you leave the king no comfort at all?"

If she were still my husband's lover, she'd been remarkably discreet. I dared not leave her behind. "The king's comfort isn't my foremost concern. Furthermore, I was led to understand that you'd taken up a vocation as an academic. Will you travel with me or no?"

We both pretended she had a choice. "Are you sure you wish to have a hetaera in your retinue, Majesty?"

"I won't. I'll have a grammarian. Princess Isidora needs a teacher."

"She's still a very little girl," Circe said.

"But already speaking three languages. Ptolemies are educated at the youngest possible age."

This was all true, but subterfuge, and Circe wasn't fooled. "Ah, education. I suppose one can never be too young, or too old, to learn."

The pain in my head made me impatient. "I'm going to be the Queen of Egypt."

"So everyone says," she replied. "But very little in life is without a price."

So, we understood one another, and I found myself grateful not to have to spell it out. She'd told me that we could learn from one another. Hopefully, in Greece, I wouldn't be required to put this to the test.

ON the morning of our leave-taking, I went to my private shrine to pray for a safe journey. Euphronius had taught me to kiss the back of my hand and display it to Isis as a gesture of welcome and to burn sage in offering. I did these things and lit candles too, so absorbed in my devotions I was startled to look up and find Juba standing in the doorway. He never came here, never even acknowledged the shrine-whether it was to forestall criticism from Rome or to leave me a sanctuary, I never knew. Now here he stood, shoulders slumped, head low, his hair unbarbered. "Don't go, Selene."

My senses were still hazy with ritual devotion. "What?"

"Don't go," Juba repeated, coming to my side. "Stay here, in Mauretania."

I swallowed. "You, of all people, can't expect me to defy Augustus."

Dark circles under his eyes told me he hadn't slept. "You're the only one who can defy him, Selene. Delay. Wait until autumn, when the sea closes, and we'll say the dispatch arrived too late for travel." Such deception wasn't beyond me, but it shocked me that Juba should suggest it, and here in this sacred s.p.a.ce no less. I'm afraid my mouth hung open. "Listen to me, Selene. I have a plan. If you were with child, he wouldn't make you go. If you were with child . . . with my child . . . he might not want you anymore."

I remembered the emperor's reaction to my maidenhead and how much pleasure it gave him to know he was the only man to have me. If I were to give myself to Juba, it might break the emperor's fascination, and a part of me seized upon this as the solution to everything. Then I thought of those statues I'd commissioned, my mother, my brothers, all those who'd died, and I came to my senses. "It would ruin everything, Juba. I'd lose everything."

His head fell back and he closed his eyes. "Don't tell me that you haven't come to love Mauretania. Can't your ambitions be satisfied with this new kingdom we're building? That's all that drives you. Ambition. You can't have conceived a true pa.s.sion for Augustus, so why can't you stay? Tell me what stands between me and your heart, and I'll conquer it."

This kind of talk frightened me. "I cannot abandon Egypt. Especially not when she is at war!"

"You worry needlessly for Egypt. I have it on the best authority that the Kandake of Meroe will send amba.s.sadors to negotiate a peace treaty with Augustus."

This news was a lightning bolt, electrifying my blood until every hair stood on end. Tingling everywhere, I scarcely trusted myself to speak. "Meroe will send a delegation to Augustus? To the Isle of Samos?"

Juba tilted his head, eyes wide with confusion. "So I'm told. The Kandake herself may go."

Any hesitation, any doubt, that I might answer the emperor's summons vanished. For Isidora's sake, I might embrace a life with Juba, but Egypt and Helios stood between us. If the warrior queen of Meroe was to join Augustus, so must I. I must see her with my own eyes. I must search her retainers for even a glimpse of my twin. I'd leave for Greece today and not all the sincerity in Juba's eyes would stop me.

Twenty-eight.

GREECE SPRING 21 B.C.

EXCEPT for the billowing purple sails on my s.h.i.+p, my arrival on the Isle of Samos was without fanfare. No cherubic children threw flower petals from the prow. No harpists played at the rail. My ladies were all well turned out and sweet-smelling but eschewed the more exotic perfumes. I scandalized no one with my dress, for my voluminous purple cloak covered me from shoulder to ankle. Let no one claim that I'd answered the summons of Augustus with a notorious campaign to seduce him, even if it was the truth.

Captain Kabyle dropped anchor and my guards escorted me to sh.o.r.e. A deep breath a.s.sured me that this place wasn't like Rome or Egypt or Mauretania. Peeking out between the foliage were beach houses, shops and villas, some painted in washed-out pastels, accented with the occasional blue or terra-cotta. Samos was the birthplace of Pythagoras, that great philosopher and mathematician. There was even a school here to honor him and a contingent of Lady Lasthenia's colleagues stumbled over themselves to make me feel welcome. They weren't my subjects, but I was Cleopatra's daughter. My mother and father visited this island before the Battle of Actium. They feasted and entertained so lavishly on the eve of battle that the people antic.i.p.ated a great victory. Now I had returned to wage a war of my own. "Great Queen Cleopatra! New Isis, New Isis!" the people cried.

Could the emperor hear them chant? Would it please him or harden his heart against me?

As a girl in Rome, my survival had depended upon my ability to predict his moods and guess at his next moves, but my time in Mauretania had obviously dulled my skills, for I certainly never antic.i.p.ated that he'd send Livia to fetch me. "Welcome to the Isle of Samos, Queen Selene," she said with her least genuine smile. "I've come to invite you to stay at our villa. You and your darling little daughter."

Livia's pleasantries were meant for our audience-the crowds and curious onlookers who gathered near the docks. Even so, her invitation was an honor that I couldn't refuse, so I took Isidora's hand and we climbed into Livia's litter. The moment the curtains shut, Livia's smile faded. "Listen to them cheer you, the half-wits. I'm the one who asked Augustus to restore this island to selfgovernance, and yet you are the darling of the h.e.l.lenes."

"Perhaps they cheer me to please you," I remarked as Isidora nestled against my hip, fists curled under her chin as exhaustion closed her little eyes. "We're allegedly family, after all."

Livia stared at my daughter's fair curls, not bothering to hide her scrutiny. "She doesn't even look like him, you know."

My daughter seemed to already be asleep, but I wished to forestall this line of conversation at all costs. "Livia-"

"She's probably a sailor's get." Livia lowered her hands to the crimson cus.h.i.+ons beneath us and let her nails dig in. "No matter how modestly you dress, you're still a strumpet, Selene. Still, Augustus will never see it, because men are fools." It rea.s.sured me to find her still full of petty insults and animosity, for if Augustus intended to punish me, Livia would have been gleeful. Instead, she was behaving like the woman who had stolen the emperor from Julia's mother and now feared that I'd steal him from her. "Last year, you ran from him, Selene. That was clever. You've learned to tease him but that game cannot go on forever. Eventually, you must surrender, and when you do, what do you think will happen?"

Lifting my chin, I met her gaze. "I think he'll make me Queen of Egypt."

She laughed, throwing her head back. "As if that would be enough for you."